


Vicious Cycle

by NeverwinterThistle



Category: Original Work
Genre: Aliens, F/F, Trick or Treat: Trick
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-10-31
Updated: 2018-10-31
Packaged: 2019-07-20 12:46:55
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,632
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16137551
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/NeverwinterThistle/pseuds/NeverwinterThistle
Summary: Most of the ships Malathi has made contact with are captained by bear-forms, big cat-forms, gorilla-forms. She once met a ship with a dolphin-form captain, and found it strange but charming.Dandelion is a rare outlier. She could form as anything at all. It’s odd that she wants to look human.





	Vicious Cycle

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Sath](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Sath/gifts).



> Your letter was fantastic, thank you for letting me write this for you!

Zero-G renders Malathi as weightless as a dust mote, drifting against her straps. On the screen in front of her, Earth is talking. She tries to understand.

“But that’s in breach of treaty rules,” she says. “Forgive me, my Rosetta is playing up. I misunderstood you.” She makes the traditional gesture, index and middle fingers pointing to the centre of her forehead. Her other hand tremors, fingers darting as she logs a job with neuromaintenance. Not even the first of this mission; hardly surprising, given the strain she puts the poor thing under.

Thirteen languages among the crew alone, not counting Dandelion. But she is grateful for the chance to understand. So many people back home don’t even bother.

Earth spreads its sunstruck surface across the panel in front of her. There are never any human faces for these messages. Only Earth. Home. It is desired that she not forget where she came from.

Even so, there remain the inevitable gaps in communications, the little leaps and overlong pauses that mark just how far she has travelled. Seconds stretch out between her request for clarification and the response that follows. Malathi is patient. She likes to think that this is why she was given her position. Malathi, who does not fear to wait. Malathi, who watches dawn creep like spilled water over the coast of Australia, and feels no prickle of impatience.

Malathi, who knows the terms of the treaty like she knows her national anthem and the wording of her university degree, and knows that she has certainly misunderstood what Earth is telling her to do.

She will confess it to Dandelion afterwards, laughing and embarrassed. _I think I need a vacation, my mind is going to putty. You can manage without me, can’t you, Captain? I need to get my synapses scoured._ Dandelion won’t tease; the concept is beneath her. Beyond her. Outside her. She will not tease. Nor will she disapprove, or write Malathi up for growing overly casual in the line of duty. No. Dandelion will listen. And then, if Malathi is lucky, maybe she will speak.

“The rules have changed,” Earth says, abrupt and static-stricken, growing clearer as the audio is scrubbed and filtered and translated for Malathi to comprehend. “They were wrong when we agreed to them, and that’s a mistake we won’t make again. We weren’t treated the way we deserve. Have you kept up with the debates, First Lieutenant?”

The message cuts out, and Earth awaits a response. Malathi doesn’t know what to say.

She doesn’t follow the news as much as she should; the politics and diplomatic ties and severances, the constant push and pull that defines her leaders. She feels so distanced; her crew don’t share a single nationality between them, but the clashes are mild at worst. Minute cultural misunderstandings, cooped up pettiness, easily resolved. Not for her, the resource wars that break out at the drop of a bomb, the constant conflicts and sulky resolutions. She doesn’t like the news.

She doesn’t like the forces she sees rising to the surface, like filthy oil slick on ocean waters. The loudest voices. The ones that shout, accuse, overpower. She hasn’t paid them the attention they deserve, even though they begin to replace her superiors back home. How can they affect her, so far away, so unimportant? She has a small ship, a military scouting vessel exploring a galaxy deemed “probably unproductive”. She is Malathi, who only draws the attention of her crew, and of Dandelion.

“I know,” she croaks, wishing for water. There is none within reach. “I read the debates. Sometimes.”

 _They make no sense to me_ , she wants to tell the face of her planet, and the voices behind it. _Fair or not, we signed the treaty. And why would they cheat us? They don’t know the concept. Ask them if they meant to take advantage of us. Ask Dandelion if she thinks we’re less than her. She will not understand._

There are so many things Dandelion doesn’t understand. Why Malathi eats the green and orange and yellow and violet foods, but not so many of the reds or whites; why Malathi speaks to each of her crew at least once a day, and asks them how they are feeling; why Malathi smiles when they drift past each other in the sealed corridors, fingers brushing walls that thrum with the force of their movement through the vacuum beyond.

Every day, she sits near Malathi and waits as she meditates, uncomprehending in her silence, patient nonetheless.

Most of the ships Malathi has made contact with are captained by bear-forms, big cat-forms, gorilla-forms. She once met a ship with a dolphin-form captain, and found it strange but charming. There is a tradition of forming as old Earth creatures, now extinct; no one has ever learnt why. Questions are met with silence.

Dandelion is a rare outlier. She could form as anything at all. It’s odd that she wants to look human.

“The United Planetary Council is changing its policies to reflect the voices of its newly elected members. Earth has spoken. The treaty is to be brought under review, on the grounds that its terms were unfair at best. At worst, they could be considered an act of violence against humankind.”

There has been no violence since those hazy early days of first contact and misunderstanding. Even those casualties were few, now hailed as heroic, their names immortalised. Negotiation came quickly. Cooperation soon after. There has been no violence since.

“We were rushed into agreeing to an unfair deal, and that’s not right. We need to re-evaluate.”

The terms have always seemed quite generous to Malathi’s eyes. The technology alone was enough to advance humanity by centuries. Earth’s overheated seas are cooling, the ice caps slowly reforming, the air clearing; all through the science gifted under treaty terms. Very little was asked in return. Just that every spacefaring vessel they were gifted be led by a captain, in whatever form they choose.

“They’ve been spying on our spaceships. Stealing our secrets, looking over our shoulders.”

She has never thought of it as spying, or even supervision. _Companionship_ feels more apt. In all the long hours she has spent at her captain’s iridescent metal side, Malathi has never felt threatened.

“For the moment, we don’t need you to do anything other than your normal job. Be alert, be observant, keep up the regular reports. We just want you to pay a bit more attention to your captain. Let us know what it does, and what information it accesses. If it says anything at all, we want to know. That’ll be enough for now. We’ll let you know when your orders change.”

Now who’s spying? Malathi wonders. She hasn’t felt this uncomfortable since being hand-selected to train for the intergalactic exploration branch, and having to walk past the hundreds of other candidates from her province who would now stay behind.

She is Malathi, from a small island on a small planet in a small galaxy, and she doesn’t belong in a conspiracy.

The message cuts out, Earth’s rounded surface going black like the closing of an eye. Malathi unstraps herself. She pushes off from the console and begins the drift to command central.

Dandelion is waiting for her.

“Captain,” Malathi says as she enters. She salutes. Dandelion returns the gesture. The underside of her arm glistens as it rises and falls.

“I had a briefing with Earth,” Malathi says. She pushes off a little too hard from the entrance, shooting across the command centre, stopped by a steady hand to her upper arm. The little metal ball joints in Dandelion’s wrist and elbow click against their lattice. “There have been many changes. I should have read the news more carefully.” She settles into her seat, straps fastening.

Dandelion doesn’t speak. Her fingers flicker on the console; she pushes several datapieces over to Malathi’s side.

_World’s Coral Reefs Showing Signs of Resurrection; Bleaching at a Thirty Year Low._

_Ocean Levels Fail to Meet Forecast Yearly Rise, Prompting Hopes of Possible Retreat in Near Future._

_Sparrow Flu Vaccine Trials a Resounding Success, Mass Distribution To Follow Within the Month._

“Thank you,” Malathi says, touched. Academically, she knows that there is no kindness in the gesture. Dandelion understands that a Malathi in a low mood will perform suboptimally; she doesn’t need to grasp the concept of _mood_ , only the outcomes associated with it. Address the problem at its source, in the most efficient manner. This is how Dandelion processes.

But it’s impossible not to perceive her processes as simple kindness. She’s always so quick to notice, and to act. Malathi has never met any human who could read her like Dandelion can.

From the corner of her eye, she watches her captain’s interactions with the control panels. There is always so much to see; she is a constant source of motion, her microlattice “skin” twisting and reshaping to follow her humanoid form. Her arms are alternately like tightly braided rope, like honeycomb, like the million miniscule craters in coral or bone marrow. Like a network of dandelion seeds still attached to their flower; from this Malathi suggested a name. It is a source of constant joy to her that Dandelion accepted it.

“I’ve been told to write my reports more…carefully,” she says. Another datapiece appears on her screen; several high-def images from home. Her island’s green and the ocean’s blue. A little Earth all on its own.

It makes her falter. There is a fine line to be walked here; she serves her planet first and foremost, she has earned her rank with her judgement, her patience, her determination. But the treaty states that she should also obey Dandelion. And loyalty states the same.

She can’t have it both ways.

Dandelion’s lattice stretches, coils back together. It twists across her chest, the silhouette of her ribcage and the extrusion of her ornamental breasts. Her silvery joints peek through underneath, shoulder, wrist and elbow. Processing; no doubt searching for the miscalculation that has led her to upset Malathi further.

She is a woman because of Malathi. Because when Dandelion was given her crew and a database of 3D sculptures to plan her forming from, Malathi made the irreparable mistake of stepping into the projection zone. Too overawed by her new superior officer, still vaguely cloud-like, thin metal strands airborne, swarming like snakes. Not as patient as she should have been. Her body scanned in seconds, projected in 3D with all the rest, and now Dandelion is woman-form, instead of bear- or dolphin- or gorilla-.

This is not a loyalty Malathi can ignore.

“They want me to spy on you,” she admits, hating the words as she utters them. “I’m afraid it’s only the beginning. The treaty comes next.” So new, and already challenged. How quickly humanity adapted to the novelty of companionship among the stars, and began to take it for granted. How easily they forget those early days of excitement and cooperation. How much smaller the universe seemed when they were no longer alone.

“I don’t want to do it,” Malathi says when Dandelion doesn’t respond. She turns in her chair, although there are no eyes to make contact with, no expression to parse. “I don’t know what to do. Captain? Please. You have to tell me what to do.”

And finally, Dandelion stirs.

 _Our calculations agree with your assessment_ , she says in tones like hollow bronze. Her mouth shapes the words, pushing them out from where they form somewhere beneath her lattice.

 _We predict a complete breakdown of all diplomatic agreements within the space of five years,_ she says without inflection. _It was a likely response to the information we pretended to accidentally reveal to your leaders._

“I…what?” It’s not that she doesn’t understand; her Rosetta is apparently functional, distressingly so. But the words it gives her make no sense. Subterfuge is not the way her captain functions.

 _We shared images_ , Dandelion says. _Datasets, reports. We showed your leaders our home world; a planet almost identical to your own, aside from the damage you have caused. A fertile world, wild and undeveloped, bursting with the resources we have never touched. It was a very good facsimile. We tailored it to your needs._

“You lied,” Malathi breathes. “But you don’t lie.”

_We have only ever told one lie. We deemed it a necessity: the lie that reveals the truth. Our calculations required it._

Malathi understands the calculations; the electric sparks that form beneath the lattice, easily conducted inside and across woven metal wires. The thoughts. The reasoning. She has wasted so many hours watching their afterimage flit across her vision and the countless lines of Dandelion’s body. Iridescence on the lattice. Aurora borealis projected on bronze. She loves the way her captain thinks.

Only now does it start to scare her.

 _Your leaders will eventually sanction a war against us_ , Dandelion says. _We are almost certain of it. We are not surprised by the outcome. You will hurt us._

Malathi wants to argue. But she shouldn’t argue with her captain, and she wouldn’t know how to begin.

“I won’t join any war,” she says helplessly. “You know me. I never could.”

 _My calculations agree with your assessment_.

She is Malathi, the patient, the loyal, who loves her crew, though not quite as much as she loves her captain. She sits in the command room of a ship too far from home to help. How can she convince, when her leaders hide their faces, and her messages only arrive after minutes of silence? The journey home would take at least a year if she burnt maximum resources and disobeyed all her orders. She would arrive to a court martial. Who would listen to her then?

“I’m sorry,” she says.

 _Always an unfortunate outcome,_ Dandelion says. _But by now we know to expect it._

_Perhaps the next ones will be different._

There is a moment in which the Rosetta feeds through this impossible statement, and Malathi refuses to comprehend. But the words are there whether she wants them or not, however much they hurt her. She hears them. She feels them grow within her, spreading like choking weeds.

And now Malathi sees, as though the history of her kind and Dandelion’s stretches out in front of her, written like a holy text. The first contact, the quick cooperation. The gifts of technology: a slow solution to their very old problems, a rebirth, a reincarnation. And Dandelion’s kind, watching. Calculating. Testing. Over and over again across galaxies and planets and unfamiliar races, each so certain of their uniqueness.

Each one failing. The cycle begins anew.

“How many?” Malathi asks eventually.

Dandelion is silent. Maybe she doesn’t know. Or maybe she has decided not to tell, for Malathi’s sake.

Maybe kindness isn’t quite beyond her after all.

“Now what?” she asks instead. A productive question. Something to focus her mind on. “What do we do next, Captain? Dandelion?”

_Nothing different. We gather data, we follow our mission. Scout, explore, record. Go back to your home, and then leave again as the treaty fails._

Malathi blinks quickly to dry her eyes. “You’re going to leave me behind?”

_You can come. But you will be alone._

“With you?”

_Yes. The Captain stays with the ship._

She is Malathi, who isn’t so very different to a lot of other humans, aside from the secret she now carries. She sits opposite her captain’s eyeless lattice, and is permitted to take the delicate metal-woven hands in her own and hold them while they hum against her. She imagines being permitted to do so every day. She imagines never doing so again. She tries to choose the form of her future.

Dandelion is silent.


End file.
